20+ year old Rose set in his ways ? questions...

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Arachnopeon

this is going to come off as an exceptionally noobish thread for someone with a 20 year old Chilean Rose. But the circumstances are rather unique.

I got this guy when I was a kid, and that was before the internet. As a kid I knew enough to feed it, give it a home, and help it molt. Beyond that he was always low maintenance.

When I moved out, my parents insisted on keeping it. They didn't want him to leave saying that it was his home (hahah). So there he stayed, and is now at least 20 (since we don't know how old he was when we bought him).

He has lived in these conditions:

-on a substrate that is some kind of crushed walnut or whatever. I guess close to crushed gravel. He spun his web all over it though, so it's not hard on his feet.

-at room temperature. I recently started giving him a hot spot during the day of 28C, but for the most part he's lived around 22C.

-at room humidity. He has NEVER been misted. And that substrate barely holds humidity. I would suspect that it ranges between 35 and 50 relative humidity.

-with a water dish and a rock to climb, but no vines or anything like that.

Anyways my parents wanted me to take him back now since they are going to travel a lot, and I was happy to get him back. I've since come to read that pretty much every aspect of his cage is wrong other then his water and hide. But honestly this guy eats well, and is super old and in great health. So my 2 questions are:

1) Would giving him the "ideal" housing at this point freak him out ? Or did my parents actually find the best way to have this guy grow old and healthy ? I will give him more humidity during molting, since he was pretty weak the last time that happened.

2) Would you handle him now, after maybe 13 years of not being handled. I used to handle him all the time as a child. he would even crawl and my face, and never was mean. but now I picture him being like the 2 old guys on the muppets. Grumpy and old.

ArachnoGod

Old Timer

Joined

Feb 13, 2006

Messages

8,662

What is your idea of "ideal"? It sounds like "she" has been well kept all this time and is doing fine so why change anything. I mean if you want to put "her" in a nicer tank you can do that, but keep everything else you have done in the past the same. 20 years for any T is good so you must be doing something right.
As for handling, some say do some say don't. Handling is not something they are going to get used to so it really does not matter how long its been since "she" was handled. But if you want to just make sure you are sitting or low to the ground so if "she" decided to run off your hand the fall is very short. And if you chose to handle limit the number of times you do so, this will reduce the stress you put on "her", because it is stressful to one degree or another.
You have a female if it is indeed as old as you say it is.

Arachnoangel

Old Timer

Joined

Jul 17, 2005

Messages

844

First off I highly doubt it's a "he" at 20 years old. I would say it has to be a female.

Next T's live day by day they don't have the capacity to think back. Thus changing substrate or humidity may send her up the wall for a few days, but that will only be because she doesn't like it at this moment in time.

Handling is determined by the T's personality. You could have the 1 in 900,000 rosies that are demonic, or she could "wake up on the wrong side" and you get tagged. Or she could be calm as ever and nothing will ever happen.

Arachnopeon

First off I highly doubt it's a "he" at 20 years old. I would say it has to be a female.

Next T's live day by day they don't have the capacity to think back. Thus changing substrate or humidity may send her up the wall for a few days, but that will only be because she doesn't like it at this moment in time.

Handling is determined by the T's personality. You could have the 1 in 900,000 rosies that are demonic, or she could "wake up on the wrong side" and you get tagged. Or she could be calm as ever and nothing will ever happen.

Arachnoemperor

this is going to come off as an exceptionally noobish thread for someone with a 20 year old Chilean Rose. But the circumstances are rather unique.

I got this guy when I was a kid, and that was before the internet. As a kid I knew enough to feed it, give it a home, and help it molt. Beyond that he was always low maintenance.

When I moved out, my parents insisted on keeping it. They didn't want him to leave saying that it was his home (hahah). So there he stayed, and is now at least 20 (since we don't know how old he was when we bought him).

He has lived in these conditions:

-on a substrate that is some kind of crushed walnut or whatever. I guess close to crushed gravel. He spun his web all over it though, so it's not hard on his feet.

-at room temperature. I recently started giving him a hot spot during the day of 28C, but for the most part he's lived around 22C.

-at room humidity. He has NEVER been misted. And that substrate barely holds humidity. I would suspect that it ranges between 35 and 50 relative humidity.

-with a water dish and a rock to climb, but no vines or anything like that.

Anyways my parents wanted me to take him back now since they are going to travel a lot, and I was happy to get him back. I've since come to read that pretty much every aspect of his cage is wrong other then his water and hide. But honestly this guy eats well, and is super old and in great health. So my 2 questions are:

1) Would giving him the "ideal" housing at this point freak him out ? Or did my parents actually find the best way to have this guy grow old and healthy ? I will give him more humidity during molting, since he was pretty weak the last time that happened.

2) Would you handle him now, after maybe 13 years of not being handled. I used to handle him all the time as a child. he would even crawl and my face, and never was mean. but now I picture him being like the 2 old guys on the muppets. Grumpy and old.

there is only 2 things i would change. #1 the substrae, instead of the walnut sheel i would use peat or coconut fiber. I prefer peat but ... And bone dry is the way to keep them , They live in a pretty harsh place in the wild and i think it has never rained there in recorded history... not sur ethey has a little about there on animal planet the other day but not about G. rosea for some reason.
#2 take out the rock. its a terestrial trantula and falls are bad news for them espcsially onto a rock. however mine old girl dosent climb at all so it could be just a moot point ...

and like someone else said no way is it a male after over 20 years and still kicking. ...

ArachnoGod

Old Timer

Joined

Feb 13, 2006

Messages

8,662

If you want to conduct a tank cleaning you can. Just make sure you do a good job. Dump out all the old substrate,clean everything with a mild bleach solution, rinse well and let dry. Then add the new substrate, then your T. After this tank change I dont see you needing to ever do it again unless you have a mold or mite problem, in those cases substrate change is automatic.
Can you post a picture? I want to see her.

Arachnopeon

Joined

Jun 6, 2007

Messages

5

haha I have the oldest BOY spider in the world !

And ya, I'll get you guys a picture. May be a few weeks, but I'll get one. Ok I'll ask my pet store for a good tarantula substrate. I really liked this stuff because it's so clean ! But I'm sure the coconut stuff must be similar...

oh oh I forgot to tell you guys. Billy plays this game, my father invented it. This will crack you up:

Billy has 6 plastic little colored gem stones in his cage. If you place them anywhere in the cage, at night he goes to burry them. Then you dig them up and place them again. And he burries them again ! And on and on, he loves putting them underground. It's pretty cute.

Arachnopeon

I wonder how much more then 20 SHE is. ok ok I admit it's a she. Just took me a while to accept it, haha. She was pretty big when we got her, so she could be so much older ! I wonder how long she'll last ? I kind of accepted the idea that she'd never die

Arachnoking

I wonder how much more then 20 SHE is. ok ok I admit it's a she. Just took me a while to accept it, haha. She was pretty big when we got her, so she could be so much older ! I wonder how long she'll last ? I kind of accepted the idea that she'd never die

i feel the same way about my B.SMITHI she's 19 yrs:clap: who really knows on the lifespans,it's great that they live very long,and yeah yours could be alot older,amazing that's what i love about these critters,and yeah you could get very attached i know i am.

Arachnoemperor

Old Timer

Joined

Jan 23, 2006

Messages

3,513

Here is my old girl.
She is the biggest G. rosea i have ever seen(in person). I am certian she was WC as she is probably older than the T keeping hobby lol I only bought her because of her size and tempeament I really didnt want anothe rosea so i sold the 4-5" ls one to someone for 8 bucks shipped lol she was pretty too but man that extra 1-1.5" LS made a big differance in body size between the two i had
at least older than the G., rosea has been the common T in it.
not sure how big she is , the leg span is maybe 5-6" but the carapace size seems much larger than other similar LS roseas i have seen. She also seems to be quite calm. never a threat display never a hair kicked nothing . she does sometimes try to hide if i touch her but not so much as a quick jjump away

Arachnoemperor

good catch...I totally missed that
I dont give any inverts "hot spots" they seem to do just dandy at a consistant temp. I keep all of mine at room temps with no heat except the normal heat in the house the ones that are more in need of warmer climate i put next to my PC which is a heat pumping machine lol
they all stay between 75 and 85 degrees including the roach colonies which seem to be reproducing just fine. I assume if i had them a bit warmer they would make more roaches faster but thats fast enough for me to feed lol

Arachnoprince

Old Timer

Joined

May 7, 2006

Messages

1,123

if you just bought the T and had that substrait in id advise u to change it, but since its adapted to it like it has i say why not just leave it. Although changing it wouldnt hurt, its pretty much up to you.

Arachnobaron

Old Timer

Joined

Mar 2, 2007

Messages

599

Congrats

That's a pretty cool story. I agree with the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" crowd. It kind of reminded me of a conversation I had with my mechanic the other day. I've been restoring an old Bug (how appropriate, I'm thinking of having it painted like a tarantula jk), and replaced the entire engine, new block & the whole works. While I had the engine out, I had them replace some other stuff as well, and when I went back in to get the car, they had a box of parts to show me. All the parts were original components from 1973, including the generator, master brake cylinder etc. The mechanic says, " yeah, it's really good we replaced these, the new parts are so much better". Better than 35 years with no failure? Um, yeah. Just keep doing what you're doing (nix on the hot-spot) for the rest of this T's incredible long life. Congrats, I hope to be so lucky! Tony

Arachnosquire

there would be no chance on this earth that it could be a boy if thats the true age of "her"
chilean rose dont grow that big anyway, if it was a male it would have been dead meny meny meny years ago as the males die with in a year of muturing, witch is about 7-8 years for a chilean rose.
so "her" name would have to be canged to billy-jean
as for handling, i never hold any of my tarantulas as i dont agree with it, but, you can hold her again if you want, but being sooo old i think if might be best to leave her at her own thing.